Russellville mother Stephanie Tanner hopes that a new statewide research project will open doors for teenagers with disabilities to find jobs that match their interests and abilities.
“Dreams don’t end just because the level of ability is different,” said Tanner, who has six adopted children with special needs. “I still have dreams that my kids are going to be a valuable force in our workforce.”
A five-year, $32 million research project just getting underway will focus on helping teens with moderate to severe disabilities get their first jobs, said Brent T. Williams, associate professor of rehabilitation education and research at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.Williams is the principal investigator of the Promoting Readiness of Minors in Supplemental Security Income, or Promise, program.
Philip Adams, a liaison in Gov. Mike Beebe’s office,was selected to direct the program, Williams said. By the end of the month, the Promise program will appoint directors of training andrecruitment, as well as four regional directors.
A two-year effort to recruit children to participate will begin in mid-March, Williams said. He plans to study 2,000 teenagers who receive Supplemental Security Income through the Social Security Administration. Half of the teenagers will be assigned to a group wherethey will receive the same services they do now, while half will receive additional services and intensive interventions.
Williams anticipates that the project will confirm that paying for more intensive services before teenagers with disabilities graduate from high school will lead to jobs in their adult years. If they can support themselves with jobs, they won’t need to depend on Social Security benefits, he said.
The program ultimately will employ 90 professionals over a five-year period, said Adams, who is based in Little Rock.
Adams was working as a special assistant for Beebeand had an active role in a group of representatives from state agencies and nonprofit organizations that helped develop the grant proposal. When he saw the director position open, he decided to apply.
“It’s a very, very large project,” Adams said. “In the proposal, we laid out the blueprint of what we wanted to do. Now it’s time to take the blueprint and build it.”
The program office has divided the state into four service regions, Adams said. Each of the four regional managers will oversee a team of case managers who will coordinate services and interventions for 20 teenagers and their families.
The case managers will make sure families have the services they need at the right time for the teenagers to be successful in achieving their educational and career goals, Adams said.
The program also involves recruiting businesses willing to provide jobs, Adams said.
When teenagers with moderate to severe disabilities finish high school, they can apply for vocational rehabilitation services, said Jim Moreland, associate director for special programs for Arkansas Rehabilitation Services, a division of the Arkansas Department of Career Education. The division already helps people with disabilities obtain employment or remain in their jobs.
The Promise program will provide disabled teenagers with jobs that will build work skills and help them develop relationships with employers, Moreland said.
As they begin working, however, they risk losing the social safety net, Moreland said. The case managers working with the research study educate participants and their families about the risks and benefits of competitive employment.
“They’re going to be confronted with multiple challenges,” Moreland said. “It’s going to be a major shift.”
The overall lifespan for people with significant disabilities is increasing, with some individuals living into their 60s and 70s, Williams said. That means children with disabilities will be in line for decades of payouts from the Social Security Administration unless they can succeed in the workforce.
“The trade-off for the social safety net is in a large way a loss of independence,” Williams said. “The quickest way to get someone independent is competitive employment.”
Tanner’s children with special needs range in ages from 9-21. Her 11-year-old son is deaf and legally blind but has ambitions to be a product tester, she said. Through experience, he learned he could get a television remote wet three times before it stopped working. Her 16-year-old daughter with Down syndrome has put together makeup bags with samples and sold them.
“Everybody has a skill set,” Tanner said. “There’s got to be a lot more flexibility of jobs with the people we’re talking about.”
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 02/17/2014